Mapping, GIS and Augmented Reality

A very relevant take about mapping, GIS and Augmented Reality in O'Reilly.net by Tyler Mitchell (via the goewanking mailing list).

I want to see AR applied to my area of interest - mapping. While certainly AR has some strong ties to locational information in general, it could serve a very specific purpose in various industries using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and mapping. Many of the key data requirements for AR are readily available in GIS data managed by government and industry

Well that's something we discussed this morning in the train with fabien: how the locative/GIS community and the AR people are connected. They do have similar problems to handle but there does not seems so many cross-over. The author advocates for more connections, especially to use of 3D maps in AR applications which is indeed pertinent:

We produce a lot of maps for field crews working in the forest. It would be great if they could have those maps digitally available through AR - projected in front of them. They could find the road turn-off to their work area easier, as it gets drawn as a thick line in their display. They could see the boundaries around their areas without having to hunt for small plastic ribbons tied on trees every few meters. Or, better yet, they could fly over areas in a helicopter and look down seeing their areas outlined in red on the ground. (...) I believe it's time to liberate that data from 2D conventional maps and start getting up front and personal with it in the real world.